Weekday
The weekly feature page of the University Daily Kansan March 29,1978
The Last One-Room-School in Kansas
When a teacher has to give attention to eight graders, sometimes students like 6-year-old Tony Miller, first grade, have to resign themselves to a long wait.
Photos by Randy Olson Story by Robert Beer
All ages line up for a spelling bee: 12-year-old Norma Burris, sixth grade; 10-year-old Steven Cobery, fifth grade; 8-year-old Jennifer Thummler, second grade; 8-year-old Karla Hoeper, third grade; and 6-year-old Tony Miller, first grade.
Susan Beesley, center, has to prepare work for eight different grades. She lectures geometry to the sixth grade as 10-year-old Kurt Hooper, fourth grade, left, and 10-year-old Steven Coberly, fifth grade, listen. The younger children profit from the advanced classes' work, she said.
GOVE—Pictures of presidents hanging on the walls of the schoolhouse suggest that time stopped in 1963. The last president was a baby, newly who was assassinated Nov. 22, 1963.
The school, Missouri Flats, seems to be frozen in time. It's a one-room schoolhouse—the last of its kind in Kansas.
Missouri Flats has only 15 units this
Missouri Flats has only 15 pupils this year in the first through the eighth grades.
The children play together during
parties and each other with
antibiotic flash cards.
Fred Crippen, who retired in 1971 after teaching for 47 years, the last two at Missouri Flats, said the one-room school helped the children to learn.
"It doesn't hurt any student to listen to an older student," he said.
However, even though the school may be productive to good education, it does have drawbacks.
To get to the school you take Interstate 70 to U.S. 23, turn south and drive 30 miles, then east one mile, south one mile, and east another mile. The nearest town, Gove,
For example, because of its isolation,
the western Kansas school has trouble
retaining students.
with a population of 173, is 12 miles away
Gave is about 120 miles west of Havs.
The school has had five different teachers during the six years.
The teacher this year is Susan Beesley, a recent graduate from Fort Hays State University.
"You're watching a rookie in action," she said.
Beeley said she probably wouldn't have taught at Missouri Flats if her husband had quit.
The Beesley's farm is a mile away
However, Beesley seems to handle the one-room school with success.
To assist her is a teacher's aid, Velma Briggs.
While Beesley is teaching one group Briggs superfesses the other students as the teacher.
Briggs, who taught briefly in the school during World War II, has been the teacher's aid for nine years. During the war she was able to teach because of emergency legislation enacted to relieve teachers' shortages, she said.
the children who eventually leave to attend high school in other towns tell Bishop James that
Fourth Grader Pat Miller, 11, agrees. He attended elementary school in Salisbury, as also was his brother.
"I like it here best," he said, because at Salina the classes were much larger.
"I think we expect more from them here," Briggs said.
WEB 4K / IMAX
Although Beesley and Briggs expect more from their students because of the one-room atmosphere, the students come to school during classing else because of the school's location.
"Most of the farmers around here have already reared their kids."
"During the spring, we have to check the playground for rattlesnakes." Briggs said.
Beesley said that most of the pupils were from families that work in the feed lots and the school. The feed lots have a bad year and lay off employees, the school's population would decrease, she said. But the school would be more productive in increase in the near future, Beesley said.
As the clock on the wall indicated that school was over for the day, the illusion of time standing still evaporated. The children ran screaming out the door.
The twice-daily ritual shared by all the students is the flag raising and lowering. 14-year-old Dawn Miller, eighth grade, and 11-year-old Pat Miller, fourth grade, take down the flag at the end of the day.